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When I write to him, I say "I count the days until I see you again" and "I miss you more than I can say". And it is true. It is true. But all the same, the days pass quickly enough, and I am not lonely.
At first I envied my companions, because they had something to do. True enough, I should not like to spend my time hacking at a tree that never falls, but there were days when even that seemed better than idleness. I tried once. Did you know that? Wu Gang helped me fold back my wide sleeves, and showed me how to hold the axe, and I swung it back and drove it forward with all my might. It barely made a dent, though Wu Gang pretended to be very impressed.
The Jade Rabbit's work is far more delightful. All day he (or is it she? I've never been able to tell) works in his laboratory in the palace, making pills and potions. I want to help, but I am so afraid of getting in the way. There are cures for everything: for headaches and tummy aches; to keep away death, and to keep us young. There is not yet a cure for being up here, although the Jade Rabbit tries very hard.
It was the Jade Rabbit who showed me how to look down at the earth, to focus in and watch men and women going about their daily lives. There are so many lands, and so many people, all so different, all so much the same
My favourite time of year is the Mid-Autumn Festival. That's when they look back at me. Once it was only in China that they looked back, and the rest of the world stayed dim. Now it is different. The Festival is celebrated all over the world, and wherever I look there are faces beaming up at us.
Wu Gang brings us Cassia wine, harvested from his tree and fermented in the Jade Rabbit's laboratories, and we sit together looking down on the earth as it spins slowly round. China is still the brightest place: everywhere there are faces, young and old, rich and poor, happy and sad, gazing up at us. In Australia there are a few bright clusters of people celebrating the Festival, and many pinpricks of light, which I can zoom in on and see individuals and families having their celebrations.
As the day wears on, we come to the Americas. The North has many bright places, the South a few. Some feel homesick when they give their mooncakes, and then my heart sighs, because I too am very far from home. Others give the cakes grudgingly, encouraged by parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles. Their home is where they are. Still more tread both paths: they are at home, but happy to have another home too.
On, on! By the time we get to Europe and Africa, we are all a little drunk. Not many in Africa celebrate the Festival, but everywhere in the world there is someone. In Europe the clusters are smaller than in North America, but closer together. I can see into their hearts, and so many think the same thing: we may be far apart, but today we are looking at the same moon.
And the thought of it – and the wine – makes me shed tears. And I stoop down and pick up the bright dust beneath my feet, and hold it to my cheek and run it through my fingers, because somewhere I have a husband, and he too is watching the moon.
